Fiction

Last year I was assigned to read a book on creative writing. I wound up choosing Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft; a cheeky, bright, and inspiration text by one of the most successful authors in the business.

In between snippets of Stephen King’s life and his personal experiences with writing, I found advice in the text that I will carry in my heart forever. Despite being known for his popular horror fiction, such as It, Carrie, and Cujo (all of which have been adapted into movies), Stephen King has written dozens of short stories, poems, essays, and anthologies. In this book, King hands the reader the keys to his success and teaches us how to live a writing life. Here 10 snippets of practical, and not-so-practical, writing advice from the King himself:

1) “The scariest moment is always just before you start.”

For me, staring at the blank page of a notebook or the blinking little mouse button on the empty Word screen of my laptop can be the most intimidating part of the writing process. I can have an entire novel mapped out in my head one minute, then sit down to write the next and completely lose everything. You sit there, staring at blank nothingness, wondering where the words are and why they’re evading you. You start to feel like Spongebob in that episode where he’s trying to write an essay about what not to do at stoplights. What works the best in this situation, and King will tell you this himself, is that you just have to go. Write whatever comes out even if it sounds ridiculous and horrible. You can always go back and fix it later. What matters is getting the words on the paper/computer.

2) “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”

Honest to God, do you know how many times I’ve made this excuse to myself? “I’m just not feeling inspired today!” Mr. King says that is no excuse! Writing, like anything in the world, is sometimes quite like that job you had in high school that you hated going to but desperately needed. You have to do it every day if you want to get anything out of it. Waiting until you feel “inspired” to write will get you nowhere except feeling really pretentious while you sit in Starbucks and tell your friends you’re a “writer”. Writing can feel like a chore sometimes, but in the long run, it can feel oh-so good! So just get up and do it!

3) “To write is human, to edit is divine.”

Editing is hard. Editing your own work is even harder. Editing your own work that you love and are so proud of is the hardest. When I write something, I have trouble letting it go when I edit, but it’s a necessary evil when it comes to creating the best work you can possibly make. Sometimes taking out a paragraph or a scene or even a word that you struggled so much with during the writing process can feel like amputating a limb, but just think about how much better you’ll feel when you remove that one bit that was making the whole piece seem wrong. Editing is rough especially for those who don’t do it often, but finding a group of friends who can give you some real feedback can make all the difference and soon you’ll be able to find the mistakes all on your own. As King would say, “kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

4) “The road to hell is paved with adverbs.”

You will hear writers say this again and again. Adjectives and adverbs are your enemies and you should avoid them at all costs. For those of you who have ever read a Stephen King novel (or any of his other works) may have never put much though into this concept but I dare you to go back into your copy of The Shining and circle every adjective or adverb in the book. You won’t find very many, because Stephen King doesn’t let them drag him down to hell. There may be a lot in his first draft but by the finished copy he has taken them all down with his mighty editing eye. His writing is substantial and rich without the use of adverbs or adjectives and yours can be too.

5) “So okay― there you are in your room with the shade down and the door shut and the plug pulled out of the base of the telephone. You’ve blown up your TV and committed yourself to a thousand words a day, come hell or high water. Now comes the big question: What are you going to write about? And the equally big answer: Anything you damn well want.”

For those of you who struggle with what to write about, this quote is for yo
u. King addresses this problem as simply and head-on. You’re not limited to a topic when it comes to creativity and imagination. Don’t over-think it and just write it, okay?

6) “If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered.”

King is channeling Mark Twain here when he says “write what you know”, and sometimes what you know is going to offend people or it’s going to be so bluntly honest it’s going to make a lot of people angry. Sometimes you sit there and you’re writing and you write something so scandalous you think “I wouldn’t want my mother reading this and especially not knowing I wrote it!” but there are a lot of things out there in this big scary world you mother probably doesn’t want to know that you know. Don’t compromise your writing for the sake of attempting to make everybody happy (even your mother). If every great writer abstained from the scary topics all our greatest novels would be about woodland creatures and making friends. You’re going to write and people aren’t going to like what you have to say. Who cares?

7) “Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life.”

One of the more profound quotes in the book, this one needs very little explaining. To a lot of writers, the act of writing allows them to address things that they normally would avoid thinking about altogether. Writing can connect a person with the most tragic stories of their past as well as the happiest memories they have. Writing is the key to all of life’s joys and woes.

8) “If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut.”

I cannot stress enough how important reading is when you want to be a writer. Read all the time. Even if it’s just that ridiculous BuzzFeed article you saw on Facebook. Read it. Read the greatest works of fiction and poetry known to man, or just read some trashy 50 Shades of Grey type non-sense that you picked up on the sale rack of Walmart if that’s what you like. If you want to write the next Harry Potter or the next Great Gatsby you have to read them first.

9) “Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot if difference. They don’t have to makes speeches. Just believing is usually enough.”

Having someone who believes in you can make all the difference in the world. Support can come in many forms. You may want to see out a writing group, sharing a short story with your parents, or even just bouncing an ideas off a friend can really give you a more positive outlook on your writing and help make you a better writer.

10) “Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it’s about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.”

Writing has helped me through the toughest of times and allowed me to channel my emotions, both positive and negative, into something beautiful. Write for whatever your reasons are. I write to get happy, how about you?

Hint fiction, a genre that has been around since the beginning of story-telling, has made a great comeback on the literary scene, thanks in large part to one of my all-time favorite books, titled, aptly, hint fiction: An Anthology of Stories in 25 Words or Fewer edited by Robert Swartwood. This small, sea-foam green publication, borne of a contest Swartwood put on, is amazing for the brevity, bravery, and power of the tiny stories it contains.

The stories included in the anthology work with the intricacies of language to present a huge, multi-faceted story in a sentence or two. In the age of 140-character tweets and status updates, hint fiction is an unobtrusive genre that can be read at a glance and then internalized.

The power of hint fiction stories, however, is that they are not something that can be skimmed and forgotten. These stories, tiny though they are, stick with you. They float around in your skull until they make sense, or make you laugh, or make you cry. They make you want more explanation, more development, more closure. But most importantly, they make you want more hint fiction. These stories are addictive.

In his article “Hint Fiction: When Flash Fiction Becomes Too Flashy,” Swartwood describes the beginning of his understanding of hint fiction:

The legend of where this piece came from varies in detail, but basically Hemingway was challenged to write a story in just six words; he came back the next day with that little ditty, what he supposedly claimed was his best work.

Now do those six words constitute a story?

Some people think so; some don’t.

Some argue that there is no protagonist, no conflict, no beginning, middle, end.

Some argue that you don’t necessarily NEED a protagonist, conflict, a beginning, middle, end to make a story.”

Swartwood took this story (and the flash fiction movement) one step further:

“Me, I want to coin a term, so I’m going to do it here and now: those very, very, very, VERY short stories should be called Hint Fiction. Because that’s all the reader is ever given. Just a hint. Not a scene, or a setting, or even a character sketch. They are given a hint, nothing more, and are asked — nay, forced — to fill in the blanks. And believe me, there are a lot of blanks.”

Some of my favorites from the anthology? Only since you asked…

“Trust” – Don Lee

At the party, he tells her he’s a painter, meaning of houses. She misunderstands, assuming he’s an artist. Harmless, he thinks. (87)

“Love is Forever” – Merrilee Faber

We came around the corner and there they were; young lovers, hands clasped. I drew the outline, Joe directed traffic

“In Common” – Min Jin Lee

‘When do you read?’ Helene asked the man.

‘Before bed.’

‘Your wife?’

‘She doesn’t.’

He took out a pen, and Helene took off her glasses.

You can read the introduction and some of the stories in google books, but I really and truly do recommend buying the book for yourself. If you are anything like me, you will read it many times.

“Some of these stories suggest entire novels in just few words. So, in this small book, you have a whole library. It’s reading at the speed of light.” — Robert Shapard, editor of Sudden Fiction and Flash Fiction

I’ve always liked quotes. I also like writing. Consequently, I’ve developed a fondness for writerly advice from other writers. And why not learn from the greats? As Issac Newton says, “If I have seen further [than certain other men] it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants” (and here I go with the quotes already).

Without further ado, here’s my top five favorite quotes of writers on writing:

“All writers are readers moved to emulation.” – Henry James

Every time I read this quote, I think back to when I read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in high school. I was seventeen and, at the time, I didn’t care much about books or writing. I was the kid who’d look up the Spark Notes for Jane Eyre the period before class so I could answer the homework questions without having to do any work (I’ve changed since, thankfully). But this book grabbed me; I read it all in one day. All I kept thinking was, “I wish I had written a story like this.” I believe it’s that same impulse that drove me to write as I got older.

“Write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open.” – Stephen King

To me, this quote means that when you start writing something, you can’t have that little voice in the back of your head, saying, “Is this really that good? Who would want to read this?” You have to start off writing for yourself. Then, once you’ve got the story out, you can go back and edit it. It’s at this stage you begin to think about the audience that will (hopefully) read your work one day.

“For masterpieces are not single and solitary births; they are the outcome of many years of thinking in common, of thinking by the body of the people, so that experience of the mass is behind the single voice” – Virginia Woolf.

The things you write don’t happen isolated from everything else in the world. Whether you like it or not, what you write is in constant conversation with everything else that’s ever been written, so be aware of what’s out there, and how you can add to that conversation.

A professor of mine perfectly explained this quote the other day. Remember that outfit you use to wear all the time because you thought it looked great on you? Then you saw a picture of yourself in said outfit a year later and you can’t understand how your friends could have let you out of the house wearing it, right? This is the same thing—just insert the printed word in place of outfit (which will haunt you longer than any of your old clothes will).

This might not be the most clever or insightful quote on the list, but it’s my favorite. I know that I personally tend to write about the things that bother me. Whenever I have trouble coming up with a new story or topic to write about, I go back to this quote. What scares me, angers me, saddens me—this tends to be the same things that inspire me to write in the first place.

“The grass whispered under his body. He put his arm down, feeling the sheath of fuzz on it, and, far away, below, his toes creaking in his shoes. The wind sighed over his shelled ears. The world slipped bright over the glassy round of his eyeballs like images sparked in a crystal sphere. Flowers were sun and fiery spots of sky strewn through the woodland. Birds flickered like skipped stones across the vast inverted pond of heaven. His breath raked over his teeth, going in ice, coming out fire. Insects shocked the air with electric clearness. Ten thousand individual hairs grew a millionth of an inch on his head. He heard the twin hearts beating in each ear, the third heart beating in his throat, the two hearts throbbing his wrists, the real heart pounding his chest. The million pores on his body opened. I’m really alive! he thought. I never knew it before, or if I did I don’t remember!”

-from Dandelion Wine

Conversations with inanimate objects?

Dave Eggers.

“GOD: I own you like I own the caves. THE OCEAN: Not a chance. No comparison. GOD: I made you. I could tame you. THE OCEAN: At one time, maybe. But not now. GOD: I will come to you, freeze you, break you. THE OCEAN: I will spread myself like wings. I am a billion tiny feathers. You have no idea what’s happened to me.”

-from How We Are Hungry

Being tamed (and loved)?

Antoine de Saint Exupery

“Come and play with me,” proposed the little prince. “I am so unhappy.”

“I cannot play with you,” the fox said. “I am not tamed.”

“Ah! Please excuse me,” said the little prince.

But, after some thought, he added:

“What does that mean–‘tame’?”

“You do not live here,” said the fox. “What is it that you are looking for?”

“I am looking for men,” said the little prince. “What does that mean–‘tame’?”

“Men,” said the fox. “They have guns, and they hunt. It is very disturbing. They also raise chickens. These are their only interests. Are you looking for chickens?”

“No,” said the little prince. “I am looking for friends. What does that mean–‘tame’?”

“It is an act too often neglected,” said the fox. It means to establish ties.”

“‘To establish ties’?”

“Just that,” said the fox. “To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . .”

“I am beginning to understand,” said the little prince. “There is a flower . . . I think that she has tamed me . . .”

-from The Little Prince

Romantic endeavors?

This one is so easy.

e. e. cummings.

i like my body

i like my body when it is with your body. It is so quite a new thing. Muscles better and nerves more. i like your body. i like what it does, i like its hows. i like to feel the spine of your body and its bones, and the trembling -firm-smooth ness and which I will again and again and again kiss, i like kissing this and that of you, i like, slowly stroking the, shocking fuzz of your electric fur, and what-is-it comes over parting flesh…And eyes big love-crumbs,

and possibly i like the thrill of under me you quite so new

-from Complete Poems 1904-1962

“Waking at 3a.m.”?

William Stafford

“Even in the cave of the night when you wake and are free and lonely, neglected by others, discarded, loved only by what doesn’t matter–even in that big room no one can see, you push with your eyes till forever comes in its twisted figure eight and lies down in your head.

You think water in the river; you think slower than the tide in the grain of the wood; you become a secret storehouse that saves the country, so open and foolish and empty.

You look over all that the darkness ripples across. More than has ever been found comforts you. You open your eyes in a vault that unlocks as fast and as far as your thought can run. A great snug wall goes around everything, has always been there, will always remain. It is a good world to be lost in. It comforts you. It is all right. And you sleep.”